Fleets of vehicles, such as taxis, rental cars, construction and agricultural vehicles are most often intended for the use of many individuals and they are used hard. A continuing problem with these vehicles is the need for constant maintenance and repair. Currently, intelligence in the vehicle alerts the driver that repairs or scheduled maintenance are needed. For example, engine oil and engine coolant sensors that measure such things as temperature, pressure and level are built in to the vehicles and are monitored by electronic controllers on the vehicles to determine if the various physical parameters that are monitored are within acceptable limits. If they are not within acceptable operating limits, a message is displayed on an operator""s display panel to inform the operator that the limits have been exceeded. As another example, there are sensors on the vehicle that indicate elapsed engine hours or miles the vehicle has traveled. The vehicle controllers compare these elapsed time or distance signals against predetermined limits stored in a memory circuit of the electronic controller to determine whether a service interval is approaching. When a service interval is reached (e.g. 60,000 miles of travel or 200 engine hours), the controller indicates that service is needed, typically by displaying a message on the operator""s display such as xe2x80x9cservice engine nowxe2x80x9d.
These systems are quite useful for individual owner-operators, such as the owner of a car. They are less useful for fleet owners, since they provide these indications only to the operator, and not to the person in charge of maintenance. As a result, transient conditions, such as low oil pressure or high coolant temperature, to name but a couple, may never come to the attention of the person in charge of maintenance. Furthermore, the limits are fixed in the vehicle""s memory, and cannot be changed based upon the experience of the person in charge of maintenance. In practice, the maintenance person must go to each vehicle in turn and individually check each vehicle to determine whether maintenance is needed.
What is needed therefore is a system for automatically determining whether maintenance is needed that does not require the personal inspection of each vehicle. It is an object of this invention to provide such a system and method.
It is an object of the present invention to provide a method for automatically determining whether vehicular maintenance is needed, comprising the steps of periodically storing a plurality of values indicative of physical parameters of a vehicle in an electronic memory of the vehicle, transmitting the plurality of values over at least one wireless link to a remote maintenance computer, analyzing the plurality of vehicle parameters in the remote maintenance computer to determine if maintenance is needed, transmitting data indicative of needed maintenance over the wireless link to the vehicle, and displaying a message indicative of the needed maintenance to the operator.
The message indicative of needed maintenance may direct the operator to stop a subsystem of the vehicle, such as an engine. It may direct the operator to have needed maintenance performed.
The physical parameters may include vehicle temperatures, pressures or fluid levels. It may also include the elapsed engine hours, as well as the time, date and location of the vehicle.
The vehicle may gather the data by periodically monitoring sensors on the vehicle, such as engine oil level, pressure and temperature sensors mounted to the engine. They may also include coolant water level and temperature sensors. They may also include hydraulic fluid sensors, such as sensors indicative of hydraulic fluid temperature and pressure.
The data gathered by the vehicle is transmitted over a wireless communications link to a central processor that stores the information from each vehicle in a data structure or structures that are associated with each vehicle. The data stored by the central controller may include any or all of the data items identified above. By analyzing the data associated with the vehicle, the central controller can take one or more actions relating to the servicing and maintenance of the vehicle. For example, it can determine whether specific servicing is necessary for the vehicle. This servicing can be routine servicing based at least upon the elapsed time of vehicle operation or distance traveled by the vehicle, or it can be based upon sensor readings indicative of engine or hydraulic pressures, temperatures, and levels. The central controller can also combine any of the data received from the vehicle with data previously received from the vehicle or with previous records of servicing stored in the central controller. The previous records of servicing may include data entered into the central controller by service personnel that have serviced the vehicle, such as the date and time of the servicing and the type of servicing performed. This data, in turn, may be used by the controller to determine whether future servicing is needed as well by combining the data communicated from the vehicle with the data indicative of past servicing.
Whenever the central controller determines that servicing is necessary, it takes one or more actions. These actions may include transmitting a signal back to the vehicle over a wireless link. This signal sent to the vehicle directs the vehicle to display a message to the operator indicating that the operator takes some vehicle-related action. The signal may direct the operator to take specific operator actions within the vehicle, such as traveling to a service location, or to shut down a vehicle system or subsystem, or direct the operator to limit the range of operations of the vehicle, such as not operating the vehicle above a certain speed.
The central controller may also schedule maintenance of the vehicle. This scheduling may include electronically contacting service personnel to direct them to perform the identified servicing. The scheduling may include determining the availability of service personnel and resources, such as the availability of necessary service equipment and personnel with the expertise to perform the servicing. The scheduling may also include determining the time and place of servicing, as well as selecting and ordering the necessary supplies for the servicing. To determine the time and location of servicing, the central controller may review servicing it has previously scheduled and is waiting to be done.
The central controller may send maintenance information to remote technicians over the Internet. These technicians may then perform repairs and transmit actual repair and maintenance information regarding the actual repairs performed to the vehicle. This information may then be transmitted by their remote computers back to the central controller (i.e. remote maintenance computer) over the Internet where it may be stored in association with any vehicle identifier.